1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a production process of a light emitting device constituted such that light emitting layers formed on a substrate are mutually partitioned by an insulator layer.
2. Description of the Related Art
There has been known an electroluminescence panel having a structure in which light emitting layers containing a light emitting material are provided between stripe shape electrodes which were formed to mutually orthogonalized directions, and the light emitting layers are designed to be separated by an insulator layer by partitions constituting respective pixels. Fixed pixels selectively emit light by selectively impressing voltage between fixed electrodes which sandwich the light emitting layers, and an arbitrary picture image can be displayed.
FIGS. 6A to 6G show a portion of the production process of such electroluminescence panel. As shown in FIG. 6A, after a plural number of transparent electrodes 102 arranged in a stripe shape are formed on the surface of a glass plate 101, an insulator layer 103 is formed on the whole plane of the glass plate 101 as shown in FIG. 6B, and further, a resist 104 is coated on the insulator layer as shown in FIG. 6C. Then, the resist 104 is exposed through a photo-mask 105 as shown in FIG. 6D, and the resist 104 is developed as shown in FIG. 6E. Then, as shown in FIG. 6F, the insulator layer 103 is patterned by etching through the resist 104, and the resist 104 is peeled as shown in FIG. 6G.
According to the above-mentioned process, a fixed shape, for example, a lattice shape insulator layer 103 can be formed on the substrate. Further, after formation of the insulator layer 103, light emitting layers containing a light emitting material are formed on the region partitioned by the insulator layer 103, a plural number of electrodes are formed in a stripe shape to a direction (left and right directions of FIG. 6G) orthogonalized against transparent electrodes at the upper side of the light emitting layers in FIG. 6G.
Thus, when a glass plate is used, an insulator layer can be formed by a photolithography technology. However, when a resin substrate is used as a substrate, it is difficult to apply the above-mentioned photolithography technology at formation of the insulator layer because of problems such as heat resistance at baking a resist, solvent resistance at development of the resist and the like.
The object of the present invention is to provide the production process of a light emitting device capable of easily forming a fixed form insulator layer irrespective of the quality of the material of a substrate.
To solve the above problems, the production process of the light emitting device of the present invention is characterized in that the production process includes a process of forming the insulator layer by an electrophotography method, in a production process of a light emitting device equipped with a substrate, light emitting layers formed on the substrate, and an insulator layer mutually partitioning the light emitting layers.
According to the invention, since the insulator layer is formed by an electrophotography method, the insulator layer can be formed without using a photolithography technology in which heat resistance and solvent resistance are required for the substrate, and as the substrate, for example, a substrate made of a resin can be used. Further, the number of process can be reduced in comparison with the photolithography technology which includes process of coating, drying, exposure, development and the like of a resist.
The production process may include a process of forming the insulator layer on a transfer member by an electrophotography method, and a process of transferring the insulator layer which has been formed on the transfer member, to the substrate.
In this case, the insulator layer can be formed on various substrates by matching the property of the transfer member with the substrate. For example, when a member having elasticity is used as the transfer member, it becomes possible to correspond with a hard substrate composed of glass and the like.
The production process of the light emitting device of the present invention is characterized in that the production process includes a process of forming the insulator layer by a thermal transfer method, in the production process of a light emitting device equipped with a substrate, light emitting layers formed on the substrate, and an insulator layer mutually partitioning the light emitting layers.
According to the invention, since the insulator layer can be formed without using a photolithography technology in which heat resistance and solvent resistance are required for the substrate, a substrate made of a resin can be used as the substrate. Further, the number of process can be simplified in comparison with the photolithography technology which includes process of coating, drying, exposure, development and the like of a resist.
The production process may include a process of forming the insulator layer on a transfer member by a thermal transfer method, and a process of transferring the insulator layer which has been formed on the transfer member, to the substrate.
In this case, the insulator layer can be formed on various substrates by matching the property of the transfer member with the substrates. For example, when a member having elasticity is used as the transfer member, it becomes possible to correspond with a hard substrate composed of glass and the like.
The light emitting layers may contain at one or more of light emitting materials emitting light by impressing electric field.
The substrate may be constituted by a resin. According to the present invention, since the photolithography technology is not required to be used at formation of the insulator layer, heat resistance enough to endure the baking process of a resist and solvent resistance enough to endure a resist developing process are not required for the substrate, therefore the substrates made of a resin is not damaged.